Scenes from my FtM Clint headcanon
by Brass Mama
Summary: Started as a cracky idea on the avengerkink journal, and has evolved into scenes of FtM!Clint adjusting throughout life. Not chronological, though if I ever finish, I may go back and reorder them. Eventually Clint/Coulson. Any warnings will be posted at the top of the chapter. T for now, but leaning toward M for next scene. Next chapter will be up soon, after that, I don't know.
1. Scene 1

Rating: T+ (For language mostly)  
Author's Note: This started as a really cracky idea i had and posted on the avengerkink journal that got out of hand until I had serious case of head canon. I posted a bit on tumblr and figured I need to post it as a fill sort of thing somewhere. So, tada! The plan is for this to eventually be clint/coulson, just fyi.

1. when he got recruited to SHIELD, no one realized until he'd come in that he was FtM b/c it's been so long. (This one is a little a la Mulan)

Agent Phil Coulson stood outside Barton's room, waiting for Medical Agent Sams to finish sewing up the bullet wound (that Phil had put there). SHIELD wasn't going to be happy aboutit to start with, but in time, he was sure that the marksman he'd laid up would make a great agent. _If_ he ever got into talk to the man. Phil knew he was risky some fingers or an eye by doing this (one of the many Fury-based rumors was this was how he lost the eye), but he leaned in the private room's open door, through the curtain pulled across, "What exactly is taking so…long?"

Phil stopped mid-sentence when he saw that the nurse was helping Barton _remove_ a bandage from his chest. As soon as he'd started talking, both the nurse and Barton froze, a death glare and fright in their faces, respectively. The bandage was more or less off and left little to the imagination as Phil saw the soft curves of breasts beneath the piece the Barton was now holding against him(her?)self.

"Agent Coulson! If you could leave to get the three of us some fucking coffee before who cluster fuck this anymore, I would be inclined not to accidentally give you aspirin instead of Vicodin next time you're in my care." Sams just glared at Coulson over his glasses. "There's going to be a serious conversation about KEEPING OUT of rooms when you get back."

Phil was too stunned to really comprehend much more than the "Get the fuck out" implied in Sams' demand, and just back out of the room. He'd have to double check the file SHIELD had on Barton, because someone obviously has missed a major part of his(her?) history if no one at SHIELD had noticed this. But first, coffee.


	2. Scene 2

Author's not In my headcanon for Hakweye he wears a necklace with Saint Sebastian on it, the patron saint of fletchers and arrow smiths (not originally from this head canon, it just migrated over, and yes I blatantly stole the Scarlet Witch's name for odd reasons. This evolved from being about more than the pendant and about Clint's time in the circus.)

TW: Comtemplated and attempted self-mutilation, violence, serious injury. Closer to an M rating, but I'm gonna wait a few chapters before I adjust it.

Wanda was probably one of the few people at the circus that Clint said more than a few sentences to on a regular basis. Sure, he kinda talked to Trickshot, but that was mostly monosylabic (and yes, Clint new that word. Don't ask him to spell it, but he knew what it meant.) and with Barney… it usually was just one of them telling the other that they were going "out".

Wanda was the tattooed lady. She was almost completely covered with tattoos, except for her face and a few spots on her hips. "They hurt too much" is what she'd told Clint when he'd accidentally walked into her dressing room while looking for Barney and seen a lot more than he'd planned on. He'd asked why some of the tattoos were certain places and what some of them meant, his search for his wayward brother quickly forgotten.

It became a habit, a routine of sorts. When Clint needed Barney and he wasn't there (which was increasingly often), he'd go to Wanda and ask questions about her tattoos and then life. How are babies made? What is love? Why am I bleeding between my legs? Why is the sky blue? What am I? This last one was a big one because while Clint had been Clint since he'd joined the circus, some of the "employees" still insisted on calling him "her" and "Claire" and "freak". He didn't understand how he got to this weird in between that he knew he was a boy, but no one else seemed to see that, or at least mostly no one. Wanda gave him a sad look when he asked that question, barely sixteen then, and she reached into a drawer and tossed him a pendant. It was gold painted, as seen by the chips of the edges, and was embossed with a dorky looking archer outline with the words "Saint Sebastian" above and "Pray for Me" below.

"Clint," Wanda placed her hands on either side of his face, looking into his eyes, "I'm not the one to answer that question. That one is something I'm not sure I can answer for myself. What I do know is that you can shoot like Artemis and Apollo combined."

Clint looked back down at the pendant. "Who's this Sebastian fucker? and what's this got to do with figuring out what I am?"

Wanda gave her head a little shake, grabbing her half finished beer and taking a swig before returning to Clint. "He's the patron saint of archers, at least that's what the guy at the shop told me when I picked it up. He's the saint for some other stuff too, but this one's for archers." She reached under her shirt and pulled out a similar, nicer looking pendant with an old bearded man on it. "This is Saint Giles, Patron Saint of Outcasts… and breast feeding women." Clint gave her a side ways look. "I didn't come up with it!"

They laughed a minute about a saint of boobs and then Wanda finished, "When I really feel lost I think about how there are some many people like me that there's a saint for it, that I'm not really lost, just waylaid from my people. You're not a what, Clint. And it's going to take awhile to figure out WHO you are, but just remember that there are enough archers out there for their to be a saint for it and that you're not the only one. There's probably some of them who are trying to figure out the same things you are. You just got to make your own way and decide who you're going to be."

Three weeks later, Clint catches the Swordsman and Trickshot stealing money from Carson's payroll. In that moment, when he was being offered a piece of the money for his scilence, he remembered that Wanda had said that he had to decide who he was. And he wasn't the kind of person to stab Carson in the back for his kindnesses. The fall from the tight rope broke his right arm and fractured a rib. Barney heard what he'd done and came to see him where he was laid up in Wanda's dressing room.

"You stupid girl!" Barney screamed, hauling Clint to his feet. "Why didn't you just take the money? We could have left this shit pool." He shoved Clint back down, and the archer winced at the pain blossoming in this chest. "We could have run."

Clint just glared at Barney through his tears. Everything inside him hurt. "Not a girl." Clint muttered.

"What did you just say, you silly girl?"

Clint took as deep of a breath as he could with his rib, "I'm not a fucking girl, Barney. I'm Clint. I'm a boy… going to be a man. That's why I did it. Because real men don't stab people in the backs, Bernard Barton. Not like Dad did. not like Mom did. Not like any of the shit faces who beat us up in the homes. Those weren't real men, and I don't want to be them."

"You freak idiot, no one cares about being a "real man" when you have boobs." Barney kicked Clint's knee that hung of the side of the bed. Clint gasped, in too much pain to really scream. "The Swordsman offered me a job on his way out, I'm going with him. Done with you're dead wait, Claire." And Barney left his little sister broken in a stranger's bed.

When Wanda returned, she'd gone to get some Kodine(?) for Clint's pain, she found him sobbing silently into his arms, muttering on repeat "No one cares about who you are when you have boobs, Clint. You're pathetic. Men don't cry. No one cares about who you are." She hurried over to him and pulled at him to look at her, he pulled away. "Leave me alone! Don't look at me!"

Clint rolled to face away from the tattooed lady. He looked down at his bare chest, with wraps low around his ribcage, holding the fractured rib still. He look at how his small, but not invisible breasts sat unnaturally against him. He didn't want them. He was only thankful they were so small, because more than once Trickshot had said that if he filled out, he'd have to dress as a girl for his act, "The Amazing Hawkeye" and that he'd have to give up "acting" like a boy. Clint glared at the soft flesh that mocked him. No, he hadn't "filled out". His hips only widened somewhat and his curves remained mostly flat. From what he'd seen, most girls and women had serious curves, like a winding road, which is something he admired, but didn't want on himself. And now, he didn't want any of it. He want the curves and edges to harden and go away.

Clint heard Wanda leave, most likely surrendering to his wish to be alone. Clint rolled back over, because lying on the other side put pressure on his rib. As he refocused his eyes, landing on a set of fabric sheers that Wanda had out the cut the wrappings. He'd seen them cut through the cotton fabric like butter. How would they do on ridding himself of… his issues. He levered himself up and shifted across the bed to grab the edge of the counter. The movement went slowly and he was constantly wincing. As he move along, he saw the Kodine Wanda had bought off some dealer somewhere. What he was planning to do was going to hurt more than he already did. He opened the baggy and pulled out one of the pills, popping it in his mouth and dry swallowed it. He finished shuffling to the sheers and sat of the ottoman that Wanda had occupied earlier as she'd wrapped his arm and ribs. This would be hard with one arm splinted from elbow to wrist, but Clint grabbed the sheers with his good hand and pulled them open. They were gleaming sharp and Clint shook. He moved them toward her right breast and just before she moved to cut into her self, Wanda came back it and dropped the coffee she was carrying. The sound of the glass shattering startled Clint into dropping the sheers, accidentally cutting a shallow, but long slice across his right breast and abdomen as they fell.

"What in fuck's sake do you think you were doing, Clinton Barton?" Wanda screamed. She side stepped her broken glasses and snatched the sheers from the ground and throwing them across the room, away from Clint, who was still shocked and starting to succumb to the Kodine he'd taken.

"Can't be a real man…" He was slurring his words as he started to shed the last of his tears, "Real men don't have boobs."

And with that, as Wanda held him close, he fell asleep.

When he finally dragged himself from the drug induced haze of sleep, Wanda was leaning on her counter with a roll of bandages. Her eyes red from lack of sleep, or tears, or both.

"Clint, I have something to show you." she said.

At age sixteen, Clint figured out how he could be a real man.


	3. Scenes 3 and 4

Scene 3, sequel to scene 1

When Phil returned from getting coffees, Medic Sams was just finishing the set up with the IV. Phil passed the cup of actually-not-too-horrible coffee to the medic as he walked past Phil to the door. He set the remaining two cups on the bedside table and emptied the packets of sugar and powder creamer next to them before sitting himself in the plastic chair beside the bed.

Barton was laying back, wearing the standard, loose fitting scrubs instead on the blood stained shirt and jeans he'd been brought in wearing. He was slightly leaned toward his left side, trying to keep weight off the bullet wound that Phil had given the marksman. He also had his ankle somewhat elevated as he had twisted it when he'd jumped into a dumpster while trying to out run Sitwell. And Barton was staring at Phil. "What do you want, suit?" He didn't really sound like he cared, more like it was information in a situation where information was valuable.

"Well, for starters, you could explain how no one in the intelligence community knew that the 'Amazing Hawkeye' has been pulling a Mulan on everyone for as long as you've been on anyone's records?" Phil ripped open a couple of the sugars and poured them into his chosen coffee. He wasn't a fan of powder creamer, only having grabbed them in case Clint preferred his coffee some way other than black.

Clint huffed. "What exactly is that supposed to mean? I'm not out to save China or anything."

"I mean, how has no one noticed that Clint Barton was a woman?"

"I'm not."

"Excuse me?"

"I'm not a woman."

"I don't understand. Your blood work and the fact that you have breasts…"

"I am not a fucking girl!" Clint interrupted, "I'm a man, dammit you stupid suit. Now, what do you want, or are you just trying to piss me off enough so you can finish the job?"

Phil just sat there a moment, realizing what an ass he'd just been. He knew of transexuality, but he'd never done any research or met anyone one who felt they'd been born the wrong gender. It was something only briefly covered in the stupid work place seminars meant to reduce conflict between agents with differing views, but one slide in a two hour long course doesn't mean he knows something when he sees it. The bindings weren't solely meant to disguise Clint's (Phil was doubting more and more that the name was his birth name) gender, but it was to make him(her? Phil still was feeling unsure about pronouns at the moment) feel more like he was in the right body. Phil Coulson was an ass.

After a long while, after Clint had leaned over and snagging his cooling coffee and adding the remaining ten sugar packets, Phil opened his mouth again, "SHIELD has seen your skills and how your contracts seem to be accepted only if you believe the target deserves it. We want to offer you a chance to work with the good guys. I'm sorry for stepping in it with that comment on… you know." Phil wasn't completely sure what was making him sheepish, that he'd offended 'Hawkeye' or that he felt guilty about it. "Basically, instead of moving from place to place, job to job, would you be interested in becoming an agent of SHIELD."

Clint stared at him, unsure looking. Phil supposed that if someone had gone from accidentally insulting him to offering him a job, especially with the back ground Clint had, he'd be wary of something that seem too good.

"If I was interested, IF, what's SHIELD think about bows?"

Clint loved being an agent. He got to play with awesome toys on missions, take out the same scum he had before, and he got medical (even dental) completely covered. Of course, he made sure to use the medical plenty (more like Coulson made him go whenever he got more than a paper cut, which might be a bit hyperbolized telling). The staff in medical knew him well, mainly for either being a ridiculous flirt or for constantly trying to sneak to the range when he felt that he was well enough, even if the staff didn't agree.

This particular time, Clint didn't have a way of escaping because he'd fracture his shins when an overzealous henchman had smashed a pipe into Clint, trying to get him to give up the other sniper's position, the other sniper being Coulson, who's radio tag was (to Clint's infinite amusement after Fury had used it to check in with the teams covering the embassy) "Cheese". Clint was considering using his time laid up to try and weasel the story behind that one out of someone. Not that Clint had room to tease; his radio tag was his old circus name. What if Coulson had been some sort of performer name Cheese?

Clint didn't ponder this to far along the train of thought because he suddenly realized the newest medic (he thought the Mitchell had said her name was Kinsey or Kelsey or something else with a 'K') was staring openly at his bare chest, well, mostly bare sans the wraps. She looked super curious, but too unsure to approach the resting archer. So, Clint helped her along, "I don't think I seen you around here before," he winks at the medic, "Am I that perfect that you feel compelled to stare?"

The medic blushes. "Sorry, I was just thinking, don't the bindings get uncomfortable when it's your, you know, when you're on your period?"

Clint wasn't surprised that her curiousity had to do with the oddity of a male agent in a female body, but he hadn't expected something like that. HE clears his throat. "Sometimes, usually when I am stuck on a mission at the same time. Sometimes I'll go the week with a sports bra instead, but if I can help it, I'd rather not. Why you wondering, Medic…?"

"Kathy, Kathy Ulrich. I just got sent here from training." She smiled. "I was just wondering if you'd ever considered taking testosterone? One of my college friends takes T, and she… sorry, he says he doesn't get his period as often, or almost at all."

"Yeah," Clint sighs, "I've thought about it, but I could never afford to stay on it consistently."

"Really? I thought SHIELD medical covered hormones, at the very least, with your pay grade you could probably afford it without any insurance coverage."

"Really? But, would that throw off my abilities?"

"Not after you'd adjusted to taking them. My friend had a week or so of his system freaking out, but he was fine after some serious rest. I don't think it would be too adverse. And, it would stop the soreness."

Clint just stared at her like she was his fairy godmother come to tell him that he was invited to the ball after all. Before he'd responded, she had pulled up the SHIELD medical plan on her phone. "Yeah, hormones are covered. So's a fortnight's leave if you get surgery."

"KATHY! I NEED HAND IN HERE! Agent Long is having some trouble breathing through his mask."

"Sorry, Hawkeye, gotta work." And she ran off toward the sound of the yelling voice.

If it wasn't for the euphoria running through his mind, Clint might've been annoyed that the newbie already knew his call sign.


	4. Scene 5

5. Everyone at the Circus calls him Clint, even Barney, b/c he's never told any of them what his birth name is. In my mind it's something like Claire or Clarissa; I haven't found any direct equivalents to Clint. Or maybe his parents were super crazy and actually name him Clint, in which case I'm smelling a Clint Eastwood joke somewhere there.

"Barton, Claire." the teacher was calling roll. Claire didn't look up right away, always feeling like the name just didn't quite sound right. She raised her hand. The teacher, an older woman with graying hair, looked confused when she say the short haired child sitting at the back of the room, wearing boys' clothing. "What happened to your hair, dear?"

Claire shrugged, "I like it short. Mommy says it's easier to comb that way." She couldn't think of a time hair had been as long as most girls her age.

"Well, let your Mommy know that this school expects you to grow out your hair. And tomorrow you'll need to wear a dress. It's in the dress code." The teacher smiles before continuing down the attendance sheet.

Barney laughed at her when she told him about what the teacher had said. Mommy just shook her head and said that they didn't have any dresses for her to wear. No one told Daddy.

Claire spent the next three weeks of recess inside, until a kind neighbor sent one over. It was pink and had ugly looking frilly lace on the bottom and shoulders and Claire hated it because even though he was let out to recess, no one would let her play in it. Claire despised that dress.

After Mommy and Daddy died, a nice lady came to help Claire and Barney put their clothes and a few belongings into trash bags. Claire left that stupid dress in her closet .The nice lady said that they'd be moving to another home, with some nice people to take care of them. Claire hope that meant the people wouldn't make her wear a dress.

The first house they stayed in was a large home with lots of kids running around. The nice lady said that they'd only be staying there for a few days while she found somewhere else for them to stay. At least it meant that Claire didn't have to go to school. She and Barney shared a small room and a bed. They also shared the room with an older boy who constantly made fun of Claire and Barney by asking him why his little brother was doing this or that. Barney found it annoying. Claire didn't.

After that, Barney and Claire weren't always staying at the same places. The next place she stayed was with a man that was a little younger than Daddy was and his daughter, who was a teenager. There was also two other girls, one Claire's age and one a little younger, staying there as well. She doesn't remember their names. She was only there for two weeks before the man sent her away because she refused to wear a dress to school.

The place after that was in a trailer park, and the woman living there with one other girl was mostly passed out in the main bedroom, only waking up to go to work or to sober up enough for visits. She didn't care that Claire only wore boys clothes and that teachers kept her in at recess and that the boys at school pull her hair. The other girl was sweet though. She made sure they both ate and would help cut the gum out of Claire's hair when the boys would stick it there. Her name had been Marcia or Maria or something with an 'M'. It was years ago, and Claire hadn't liked thinking about where she might be now, seeing as she only left the trailer because one day the other girl had vanished.

The next few places were similar, but she kept getting moved because of the fact that no one could get her to wear a dress to school and not many people were willing to put up with it.

When she was ten, she was back in the same house as Barney, along with about three other kids. It was also the first time she got hit since they'd entered foster care. The woman of the house was a mean drunk who hated that her husband and her had to put up with a ton of brats in order to afford the three bedroom house.

One day, Claire came back from school with about ten packs of gum in her hair from the bullies at her school. She no longer had to wear dresses, but the kids still made fun of her hand me downs, which weren't the ones that had once been Barney's, but ones that she'd snagged from bins in laundromats and garage sales. Most of it had holes in the sleeves and legs. The other kids thought it was strange and therefore teased and bullied her. She was sitting in the bathroom waiting for one the other girls to get home from their schools to help her cut it out when the woman stumbled into the bathroom.

"What the hell have you done this time, you stupid girl?" She screamed as she lost her grip on the glass she'd been holding. It shattered on the floor, some of shards hitting against Claire's arms. "Why do you cause so much trouble? Do you just want to get hurt? Is that it?"

The first hit fell across the back of Claire's shoulder. Pain blossomed and they would be a bruise they later. The next hit was nails first across her cheek, scraping red lines into her face. Then again on the other cheek, these scratches cause by the cut glass wedding ring the woman wore. Claire screamed for her to stop, that she was hurting her. She yelled for help. But no one was helping. More hits landed on her back and shins as she curled into a ball and the woman started kicking her with the red flats she was wearing. Claire had never been fond of red, now even less so as the blur hit her in the nose, more red gushing down her cheek to the floor, pooling slowly. Claire was crying now. The beating continued until one of the other girls finally arrived and screamed, "Barney, why are you just standing there? Stop her!"

The woman was pulled back onto her ass and yelled for the fuckers to let her go. "She's a freak, she deserves it!"

Not long after, Barney came back from dragging the woman to the master bedroom and carried Claire to her bed in the girls' room. The girl who'd stopped it came and pushed him away as she worked to clean the drying blood from Claire's face. Barney didn't leave, just standing at the door for a few minutes before asking, "Why didn't you fight back, Claire? I've seen you punch those boys who put gum in your hair; why didn't you punch her?"

"Leave her alone, Barney!" the girl snapped.

"Fine!" and he left.

"Claire, look at me okay. I just want to check your nose."

"I don't want to be Claire anymore." She turned toward the girl, not meeting her eyes. "Claire's weak and a girl and can't fight back."

The girl pauses in looking at her nose. "What's that supposed to mean? You can't just not be Claire, that's who you are."

Claire... she couldn't keep calling herself that, it wasn't right. She wasn't... she's not Claire. "I'm not Claire. I don't want to be called Claire. I want to be called something else."

The girl shook her head. "Well, unless you can come up with something else, I don't know what to call other than Claire. Whatever your name, do you want me to get the gum out? I'll try to leave as much as I can for you, but some of it's pretty close to your scalp."

"Just cut it." Not-Claire responded. It wasn't perfect, but she couldn't think of any other names.

When she was thirteen, she and Barney were again in separate homes. He didn't like that she kept her hair shorter than his own. She didn't like that he refuse to call her anything other than Claire until she could come up with something better. It was about a week until Barney's 18th birthday, when he'd be let go by the system, and he decided to take Not-Claire to the carnival that was in town.

It was quite the environment, people everywhere. Barney had some money from the mystery job he never talked about, so he bought Not-Claire some tickets to play a few games. While she stood in line for the dart toss, Barney wondered off to go somewhere. She was distracted, so the man running the game had to get her attention that it was her turn. "Hey, boy! You're up!"

Not-Claire didn't even think about how the man's mistake had caught her attention better than anyone saying her birth name had. She just walked up, handed the man the five tickets that the game cost and took the five darts he hand him… him? It just felt like it fit better. "When you ready, stand at the counter, no leaning over it, and try to pop the balloons. The big green ones are two points…" The instructions were ignored as Not-Claire threw the first two darts into a small purple balloon and then a medium yellow balloon. The man running the game gave him a surprise look. _Yeah, him, he, male. It fit much better than Claire, she, her, female. _

"Quite the arm you got there, sonny. Why don't you take a step back from the counter? I'll double your points from there, seeing as you already have fifteen."

Not-Claire nodded and took a step back. She threw the next two in to two separate purple balloons. The game runner's eyebrows were trying their hardest to hide beneath his cap.

"Tell you what, Boy-o, take two more steps back and I'll give you triple points for any balloon you hit. Deal?"

The boy nodded, already taking another step and then one more. He was a good three yards from the balloon board now. He took aim and threw. It popped a yellow balloon right next to the purple one he'd been aiming for.

"That was quite a throw, son. So, what do you want?" the man motioned up to the stuffed animals hanging from the top of the stall. He hadn't really thought about prizes, he'd just wanted to play the game because at the house that was all he did all day, throwing darts at an old dart bored, winning bragging rights among the other kids. A physical prize was something new. "I don't…"

Suddenly Barney came running up to his sibling, frantically looking over his shoulder.

"Claire, we need to hide. Now!" No sooner had the words left his lips than two men round the far end of the game lane, waving guns through the now scattering crowd.

"Goddammit!" The game runner swore viciously, "Not these two again." He reached beneath the counter and pulled out a hunting rifle pointing it straight at the two men. He fire a warning shot into one of their shoulders, grounding him. The second spins toward the booth, seeing Barney and yelling, "Come back here, asshole! You stole the boss's money and he wants it back, you little shit!"

"Put down the gun, Sam." The game man said calmly.

Sam turned toward the man, sneering, "Like you scare me, old m…" the man downed him with a shot to his thigh.

Not-Claire stared in shock. "Barney… what the fuck?"

Barney didn't say anything, just leaning over to shake hands with the man. "Thanks for saving our asses, man. They…"

"I don't care what you did to piss off their boss, just keep it away from here until the end of the week. We're probably gonna have to clear out now." The man put his gun back under the counter. "What're your names?"

"Barton, I'm Barney and this is Cl-"

He was interrupted as his sibling burst in, 'Clint. I'm Clint."

"What, like the actor, Eastwood?"

Clint had had the actor in mind, but didn't want to say so. "No, it's short for Clinton."

Barney was glaring through the corner of his eye, but didn't want to make a scene in front of this man, who laughed at the boy. "Clinton Barton? Were your parents drunk when they named you, or what?"

Clint smiled. Barney stayed silent. "What your name Mister?" Clint tried not to let the joy in him soar. He had a name.

"Buck. I run the shows in the tent, normally, but Carson had the booth runner here suddenly quit. You got pretty decent aim their Clint. You should come see my act some time."

Clint was trying not to let his smile spilt his face in half. "Yeah? Which act are you?"

"Trickshot."

That night Clint couldn't sleep. Barney had said that as long as the carnival hadn't cleared out by tomorrow that they would go see TrickShot's act. But even more exciting for him, he had a name now. A name that wasn't Claire.

The next morning, while Clint was taking out the trash, he saw Barney leaning on the back of the house. "Barney? What are you doing here? You're not supposed…"

"Claire."

"Not Claire, I'm Clint."

"Whatever. We need to go. Let run away to the circus. Get out of this place."

"What? Barney, we can't just…"

"What you got a boyfriend or are you into girls these days? Is there something here in Iowa that you can't give up?"

Clint thought for a moment. "Just you." He said after a long pause.

"Then go pack your duffel and meet me at the fairgrounds in an hour. I saw them packing up. Why not tag along at least until you can see that act, huh?"

"Sure."

By noon they were already halfway out of Iowa. "What's your name, kid?" another man, who'd been introduced as Jacquese Duquesne.

"Clint, Clint Barton."


End file.
